Charity Shops – an established and valuable part of our retail landscape.

There are an estimated 11,000 -12,000 Charity shops located across the UK according to the Charity Retail Association. They play a hugely important part in many of our High Streets but for several years have received widespread criticism as somehow ‘taking over’ our local High Streets and as a result damaging the shopping appeal and …

UK Retail Post-COVID

There are still three hugely important ‘unknowns’ which I believe hold the key to the future health and recovery of the UK retail sector ‘post-COVID’ The first should become clearer from mid-April, when ‘non-essential ‘stores can reopen (in England) and shoppers are then able to freely return to their local High Streets, town and city …

Don’t Cry When I’m Gone-Nostalgia and UK Retail

Much of the media coverage over the past ten days or so, following the inevitable but slow demise of both Debenhams and Topshop stores, is the most recent reminder of an unusual social phenomenon (but which has surfaced on regular occasions over the past couple of decades) It has reignited what I can only describe …

What does the Boohoo/Debenhams deal mean for UK retail and what will happen to their stores?

Apart from the huge job losses and store closures involved, the Boohoo/Debenhams deal announced yesterday, along with what seems likely to be a similar arrangement to follow between Arcadia Group and ASOS (although yet unconfirmed) marks a real ‘watershed moment’ for UK retail. It finally confirms that the established multiple retail business growth model of …

‘Infection protection’ – a new, but important shopper loyalty factor in 2021

It’s been clear for some time that, because of fast changing customer behaviours, retailers can no longer rely on conventional customer loyalty or traditional shopping habits to have shoppers either choose to visit or return to their stores. Increased competition in most retail sectors in the UK, combined with an almost exponential growth in customer …

Are turnover-based rents the future in UK retail?

My final post of 2020 avoids the predictable review of the retail sector over the past year or the trap of forecasting what might happen in retail during 2021. Instead, I am returning to a subject increasingly mentioned in debates and discussions about the future commercial relationship between retail landlords and their tenants, which is …

The fall of Debenhams and Arcadia was inevitable: both shackled by earlier financial engineering.

It’s hard to remember when so much happened in UK retail in just a single week. Over the past seven days there have been several significant announcements, including the 12,000 jobs at risk as JD Sports pulled out of possible Debenhams takeover talks and the administrators then announcing last Monday evening that stores would close …

Walmart depart Japan – What Went Wrong?

With a population of 127 million, an extremely high per capita income and still one of the world’s largest economies, Japan has been an attractive overseas market for retailers since the 1990’s. However, Walmart has now become the latest foreign retailer to retreat from Japan. Walmart Inc. is selling most of Japanese retailer Seiyu to …

Does the UK Government really understand the retail sector?

These are unprecedented times for UK retail. As we approach the last seven weeks of the key Christmas trading quarter, the Government’s latest COVID-19 directive last week means that all ‘non-essential’ retailers across England are now closed and can’t re-open until at least early December. In Wales, Scotland, and Northern Ireland a raft of different …

A very uncertain few weeks for UK Retail

Every year at the start of the ‘Golden Quarter’ in October, all retailers face uncertainties about their critical sales performance leading up to Christmas. Have they committed to enough stock (but not too much) of the key selling products? Will they lose sales or profit because of competitors price reductions? Have they enough sales staff …